Catch 22! OSX 10.11 and Safari extensions

[macstatic]

What's the deal with Safari extensions now only being available through the Appstore along with upgrading to OSX 10.11?
I recently upgraded, but noticing Adblock was no longer in place (as I had used before) with Safari it appears I'm in a hopeless situation of not being able to install any Safari extensions unless I upgrade to OSX 10.12 Sierra.

Is this so, or are there other ways of blocking ads in Safari within OSX 10.11?
I've done all the 10.11 updates and now have Safari 11.1.2.

 

[barbu]

I found this to be a major pain as well. You might be able to find an old version of something like Ghostery around. Let us know if you solve it!

 

[macstatic]

You mean if I get hold of the old style extension files I can still use them with the newer Safari version?
Are there sites that still keep the "old style" extensions, or have Apple forced them all to close down?

 

[barbu]

I think you'd need something like oldversion.com or similar. I didn't get that far with my machine on that OS because it physically failed pretty early in the process. But I did encounter the problem and it is a real b**ch. Might need to go with Chrome (yuck).

 

[macstatic]

Thanks for teloing about oldversion.com. Handy for this sort of thing!
I did actually find a solution for AdBlock, as one of their own web pages discusses this very matter (along with a solution).

Just go to that page and scroll down to where it says "How do I install the self-hosted version of AdBlock?", but for me, following the instructions for 10.11 got me nowhere except the App store's extensions page!
The key was to read the OSX 10.12/10.13 instructions just underneath it, where you can download a self-hosted extension. It worked!

I assume it'll be a struggle to install any other extension but at least I'm done with the ads as was my goal. Hope it helps you as well!